Optical disk storage technologies store information as a series of microscopic pits and smooth areas arranged in tracks on a surface of an annular disk. The stored information is read from the disk by directing a focused laser beam along the tracks and detecting variations in the intensity of the laser beam as it reflects off of the microscopic pits and smooth areas on the disk.
A digital versatile disk (DVD) is a type of optical storage medium that is becoming more and more widely available. DVD's may be used to hold video, audio, and computer data. Currently, DVD formats include: DVD-Video for holding video programs, DVD-ROM for holding computer data, and DVD-Audio for holding audio tracks. Because of their versatility, DVD's may by used in a wide range of applications including home entertainment, computers, and business information systems. Film, television, and music producers are increasingly turning to DVD's as a medium for offering movies, television episodes and music albums to the public.
DVD's are an optimal medium for presenting full-length movies. DVD's can produce studio-like video quality and audio quality better than compact disks (CD). DVD's are also more durable that videotape and do not suffer wear from use. Presently, a single DVD is able to store over eight hours of high quality digital video information and is also able to store multiple audio and subtitle tracks. DVD's also may store information for automatic and seamless branching of video to permit viewing of multiple story lines on a single disk. Additionally, DVD's may also store text information for providing movie credit information and biographical information on the cast and crew. DVD's may also include menus and other graphic interfaces for enhancing user enjoyment by aiding user access to various features provided on the disk.
However, in the past, movies and audio recordings stored on optical disk storage media (including those on DVD) most commonly available to consumers are offered in a fixed, read-only format. With such a format, as soon as the information is stored on a disk, the information is often quickly outdated because it is impossible to add additional information arising after the time the original information was stored on the disk. Thus, producers are confronted with the problem of how to provide their consumers with current and up to date products with this format of optical disk storage media. This problem results in the current use of fixed, read-only format disks having a very short shelf life before becoming outdated. As a result, producers are forced to periodically recall older disks and reissue updated versions of their products on new disks in order to offer current products to their consumers.
As an illustrative example, if filmographies of the actors in a movie stored on a disk are included on the disk, it is impossible to go back and update the information on the disk to include films in which the actors have acted subsequent to the creation of the disk. If the movie disk is offered to consumers several months after the disk was made, the actors may have starred in other subsequent movies. As a result, consumers obtaining this disk would never be informed about these subsequent movies when viewing the filmographies stored on their disks. Thus, the producer offering the movie on these disks is forced to recall old disks of the movie and issue new disks of the movie with the actors' subsequent movies included in updated versions of the filmographies.
Another problem producers face with a fixed, read-only format is that it is impossible to correct errors once the product has been stored on a disk. For example, if text included with a movie stored on a read-only formatted disk has spelling errors, the disk must be destroyed and the corrections to the text must be stored on a new disk. This process can become very expensive and may significantly hurt the profitability derived from the issuing of the particular movie on the disk.
An additional problem producers using the fixed, read-only format have is that it is difficult to provide updates and corrections to consumers already possessing the producer's product with this format. As an illustrative example, with a fixed, read-only format, a producer is unable to add additional menus and other graphic interfaces to the disks of existing owners without providing these owners with newly produced disks that include the upgraded feature. In one option, the producer may announce a recall to owners of their existing products and offer a newly produced issue of the product as a replacement to these owners. However, this method is expensive, laborious, time consuming, and often ineffectual because existing owners rarely want to make the effort to return their disks to the producer. Another option for a producer is to send existing owners the newly produced disks without requiring the return of the old disks back to the producer. However, this option allows the owners to pass on their old disks (which are still usable) to other consumers and thereby detrimentally reduce new consumer demand for the producer's product.